1957 Thorazine ad promises "control of the agitated, belligerent senile"

Posted by Cory Doctorow, May 26, 2008 5:51 AM |

This Thorazine ad from 1957 sure tells it like it is: "With 'Thorazine', senile patients become calm, agreeable and sociable. They begin to eat and sleep better, often gain weight and improve physically. for prompt control of the agitated, belligerent senile... THORAZINE*" Link (Thanks, Marilyn!)
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#1 posted by Xopher , May 26, 2008 6:10 AM

Wow. "Ampuls [sic] for immediate effect...Also available: Tablets, Syrup and Suppositories."

I can imagine the conversations. "Look, Dad, calm down or I'll shove a Thorazine™ up your ass!"

What a bloody fucking nightmare time the 50s were.

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#2 posted by danegeld , May 26, 2008 6:23 AM

...the well-spring of joy that is the chemical lobotomy.

This is why I love the internet though - I was thinking how a Gilbert & Sullivan tour of the various psych-medicines in the style of Tom Lehrer's elements song would make a nice unicorn chaser and of course someone's already done it!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KXROnzpsrlg

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#3 posted by ROSSINDETROIT , May 26, 2008 6:29 AM

That's just beautiful. My dad's a Pharmacist and I have to make sure he sees that.

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#4 posted by Cicada , May 26, 2008 6:30 AM

Bearing in mind this is decades before even the halfway-decent Alzheimer's drugs we have now, what else were they supposed to do when grandpa's mind started to go and he got belligerent as a consequence? Straight jacket? Four point restraints? Rubber room?

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#5 posted by David D. , May 26, 2008 6:35 AM

I have one of these posted on my corkboard at work.

"Tyrant in the house?"

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#6 posted by Xopher , May 26, 2008 6:40 AM

Cicada, that's part of what made the 50s a nightmare: lack of appropriate technology. But I think it's more the tone of the ad that we're gawping at. Handy ampules...keep them in your purse so you can drug your dad into complacency if he so much as looks at you crossways.

If it hadn't been for William bloody Randolph fucking Hearst and his anti-hemp propaganda, they could just have had the old 'rents smoke pot. See? Technology they had, but wouldn't use, instead of the brutality of forcible drugging with dangerous and damaging but much more profitable compounds like Thorazine™.

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#8 posted by copydeskcat , May 26, 2008 7:32 AM

Rreminds me of the hilarious spoofs of comics book ads from the 1960s created by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons for the '1963' series:

1963 ads

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#9 posted by GibblesTheChimp , May 26, 2008 7:41 AM

I had no idea that Thorazine was in use as early as the '50s. It was sure as hell popular in the early '80s when I got sent to a psych institute because I was "depressed". Very in vogue for wayward teens at the time.
It did provide me with my one genuine out-of-body experience of my life however. After being given multiple doses of liquid Thorazine because I wouldn't calm down (I was offered the choice of drinking it or getting injected. I chose to just drink it.) I floated out of my body and wandered the halls of the locked ward I was housed. I was able to tell folks, nurses and patients, what they were doing, in detail, while I was in the padded room. They called it the Time-Out room. It was surreal and to this day one of the weirder things I have ever experienced.
Now, the next day when I awoke from a dreamless sleep (after returning to my body that was curled up in a fetal position on the floor) I had classic Thorazine overdose symptoms. It is a powerful, powerful drug and I never want to take it again. Ever. Nor would I wish it upon anyone else.
In retrospect I was being an asshole but still, overdosing a 15 y.o. kid with that crap was unconscionable.

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#10 posted by Xopher , May 26, 2008 8:05 AM

GibblesTheChimp, you do realize that that was a near-death experience, right? You really could have died. When I hear things like this it makes me wish to be an avenging spirit when *I* die, so I can go and punish people like the ones who overdosed you.

15-year-olds are assholes with some regularity. It doesn't justify poisoning them.

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#11 posted by nanuq , May 26, 2008 8:07 AM

"What a bloody fucking nightmare time the 50s were."

It's not as if they ever stopped overmedicating seniors suffering from dementia. Only the drug names have changed.

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#12 posted by Xopher , May 26, 2008 8:16 AM

Nanuq, again, it's the attitude. There's a certain amount of shame associated with drugging the old folks into submission now. Compare that with the attitude of this ad, which advocates keeping an "ampul" of Thorazine™ in your bag, presumably so that if Grandpa gets loud at lunch, you can smilingly stick him with it to avoid annoying your fellow diners.

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#13 posted by Takuan , May 26, 2008 8:36 AM

Thanks Danegeld, that was a great video/song!

Doubtless an abused drug technology in its time (and now), but considering that the violent Alzheimer's not kept at home likely ended up in Cuckoo's Nest settings - perhaps the lesser evil possible at the time.

Also keep in mind that care for you in your dotage is a question of societal wealth, today included.
It always was, and still is in some places, the ice floe, the mountain cave and all those unspoken "accidents"....

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#15 posted by cookie , May 26, 2008 8:42 AM

actually-something very similar...

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#16 posted by Takuan , May 26, 2008 8:59 AM

hmpff! forgot that, Cookie.... c'mere a minute, I want to show you my new cane....

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#17 posted by beaurybe , May 26, 2008 9:56 AM

You have to love that nice, clean, balanced international-style design, letting you know that this is a good, modern product. I'd buy it.

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